The Jurassic Book, Chapter twelve
Chapter eleven of The Jurassic Book. Plot The Rajasaurus family have arrived in the midst of Zannah's attack on the village, now Zannah was focusing on the mother abelisaur who was challenging her. Then they brawl: with battle cries, the two great theropods clash, with the Rajasaurus chomping on Zannah's neck, but she chomps on her neck to make her let go and she does, only for the abelisaur to do it again. Even so, Zannah's more superior-arms came into play and claw the abelisaur, giving the Sinraptor an advantage, and she pushes the abelisaur across the ground into the other animals. "Run" Mowgli yells and everybody scatter to make room, but the Rajasaurus was overpowered and lay defeated on the ground, prompting Mowgli and company to join in, but Zannah was too powerful for any of them even while greatly outnumbered: she was just about to finish Mowgli when a familiar bark was heard, revealing to be the Saurornithoides Hondo who charges and leaps upon his former-master, distracting her long enough for Kaa to body slam her with renewed vigor, and Hathi ram her into a building, then the father Rajasaurus bites her while she sent Lala flying, but the she-wolf quickly retaliates and Virgil rams her into another building, some of the humans even began cheering them on as the mother Rajasaurus, having recovered gets back at the carnosaur with a chomp to the head and throw to the ground, allowing Mowgli and Bagheera to jump on her: the former gouges into her neck with his knife, and the latter sinks his teeth into her nose until she shook them both off, Baloo also landed a body slam on her before Rama head-butts into her right-foot and Hathi knocks her to the ground beside a pond, they all stop momentarily as Zannah gets on her feet and roars stubbornly, but Jacala springs from the pond at that moment: the big crocodile grabs Zannah by the neck with his mouth and drags the flailing Sinraptor into a watery-grave. It was all over: Zannah's tyranny has finally been finished. The Rajasaurus look at Mowgli with respect, and he smiles. "Thank you" he whispers and the mother licks him affectionately, sliming him which made him giggle, Hondo walks to him too with an apologetic face, "I'm sorry: for everything" he mumbles, making everyone sympathetic, "you did what you had to do, I respect that" Kichi consoles and that made the Saurornithoides smile, then he surprises all by hugging Mowgli, who was stunned at first, but hugs back, then Hondo and the Rajasaurus leave, returning to the jungle, "grandma!" Alex screams and that drew everyone's attention: they see not only Alex, but Meshua, Jumeirah, Rahhar, Kamya and many other humans gathered around a mostly dead Luri, "oh no" Sandah gasps and they all rush over, "mother" Mowgli says and cradles Luri in his lap, "Mowgli?" she wheezed, "I'm here mother" Mowgli assured, "there's nothing we can do: the wound is too massive to fix" Rahhar laments much to everyone's horror, "grandma you can't die" Alex begs hugging the wolf and crying, making Mowgli cry too at seeing his son's heart break: this was like losing Alexander and Akela all over again, "well, it was worth it" Luri jokes despite her condition, "mother please: I already lost my real parents, both of my adoptive fathers and Akela, I don't wanna lose you too" Mowgli pleads, "we need you mother" Sura adds, "we still need our leader" Akru fallows with, "no, Mowgli and Vermillion are your leaders now" Luri coughed and pukes some blood out, "looks like she suffered some internal damage too" Kaa suspects, "it was nice working with you again Mowgli, those were the days" Luri reminisces, "you didn't have to do that" Bagheera notes referring to when she jumped into Zannah's mouth to protect Mowgli, "heroes always have to make the hard decisions" Luri states and looks at Mowgli, "take care of them, my son...take care of them" she requests and Mowgli nods, then she went limp: signaling her life was over. The next day, Mowgli buries Luri in her den, rolling a boulder he had Virgil fetch to seal the den up, and once that was done, Mowgli cried out a death-song, much like the one the wolves had done for him and Bagheera when they all thought the two were dead. "I'm sorry for your loss" Virgil councils as he didn't get to know Luri enough, "I am gonna miss her" Jumeirah adds, "me too, she really did feel like part of the family" Meshua adds, "Mowgli's sure come a long way in the past few days" Baloo notes, "indeed" Chil adds, Vermillion walks up to the boulder to pay his respects, "I won't let you and Alexander down Luri, I promise" he prays, Mowgli pats him and kneels to eye level, "we promise" he says and Vermillion nods in agreement. Several days later, the jungle was once again peaceful thanks to Mowgli. Vermillion, true to his promise to Luri, merged his pack with Mowgli's, and in addition a second wolf named Phaona also assumed leadership. Most were able to move on perfectly, but not Alex: he's been unusually quiet ever since; he rarely plays with his cousins, practice his hunting, or even perfect his tool usage, and it was worrying, but Mowgli said to give him time since it took him awhile to move on for Akela, so Alex was just going through the same phase. Currently he was looking out across the jungle from a random cliff when he heard rustling from the foliage, which turned out to be Mowgli, Lala, Akru, Sura, Maki, Rikki, Mang, Grey, Rusty and Marigold. "I thought you'd be here" Lala comments but Alex doesn't say anything and resumes looking across the jungle, and the others join him, "you miss her don't you?" Grey assumes, "ain't it obvious?" Alex retorts, "yes" they all answer together, "Alex, she'd want you to be happy" Maki urged, "I know" Alex mutters, "look Alex, you remember Lala's grandfather Akela, that I told you about as a bedtime-story?" Mowgli asks and Alex nods, "well, when he died, it was hard for me to accept he was reaching his end of the line, but that was only because Luri said I was still young at the time: I was still around your age than most of the animals here when it happened, us humans live a pretty long time, so long in fact that we tend to outlive most animals" Mowgli describes as Rikki gets on Alex's shoulders to cheer him up, "you're only having trouble accepting Luri's death because you're still young too" Mowgli adds, "is there any way around it, preferably an easier one?" Alex asks Mowgli, "I can't exactly help you cope with it, but I can offer advice: she'd want you to continue enjoying the experience of the jungle, can you at least try to?" he asks, "I'll try" Alex vows and they hug, "now that's more like it" Rikki cheers, "hey come on Alex, Phaona said there's a big herd of deer we can hunt" Rusty proposes, "last one there is a monkey's uncle" Marigold jokes and gallops away, "eat my dust" Mang chortles and flies away with the kids running after him, while Mowgli, Rikki and the adult-wolves all laugh and decide to fallow in a relaxed manner: knowing everything's right with the world. The End Notes *I apologize if I've made any of you cry, but in the beginning of the story "Red Dog", both wolf parents of Mowgli are said to have died (though it isn't revealed how) and Mowgli buried them in a cave with a boulder. Sure we all know the father-wolf (Alexander) here died at the hands of Shere Khan, but the mother-wolf (Luri) here never did (at least not canonically). *Making Mowgli the next leader of the wolves was based on the Russian-version Adventures of Mowgli where Akela appoints Mowgli as the new leader in the aftermath of the dhole battle. Gallery Category:Fanfiction